Complicated Affair
by VampireQueen21
Summary: Liz is a cousin of the Halliwell's, fellow witch, and Cole's secretary. She's been carrying a secret now for a few months, she knows it will eventually come out but she's hoping that day won't be for a very long time, if ever.
1. Prologue

Title: Complicated Affair

Author: Dez/Jezebel Jinx/VampireQueen21

Rating: Mature (some parts border on Adult)

Couple: Liz/Cole

Set: 5 years after Roswell S3, four years after S3 of Charmed (with some changes)

Summary: XO w/ Charmed. Liz is a cousin of the Halliwell's, fellow witch, and Cole's secretary. She's been carrying a secret now for a few months, she knows it will eventually come out but she's hoping that day won't be for a very long time, if ever.

Note: Phoebe is not going to be a bad person in this. I know weird, I'm writing this and Phoebe's going to be nice and not an evil bitch. LOL. But I really don't hate her; I only hate her when she was with Cole.

Note 2: Prue is alive and there is no Paige.

Disclaimer: I own nothing. Charmed and Roswell belong to people who clearly aren't me. Some information I've gotten from Charmed Wiki.

And I know I already have many fics that are in desperate need of updating but I just had to post this one.

**Prologue**

You know how sometimes people will tell you that they didn't know how something they did wrong got started?

She was kind of in that boat now.

Elizabeth Parker, daughter, friend, cousin, witch, and secretary was carrying a huge secret that would tear apart some of the relationships she held so dearly, and she honestly didn't know how it all happened. Sure there were little things here and there, small touches, cute smiles, a sweet compliment but nothing that by themselves would bring her to where she stood today.

One day she was a normal girl, granted a normal girl with witch powers, but a normal girl in every other way. The next day, she was a betrayer.

"Elizabeth, come on into my office. We'll get started on those letters today." Cole Turner, her boss and friend, called through the intercom.

Liz pressed the button and responded. "Right away, Mr. Turner."

She pushed away from the desk and gathered what she'd need to help him. Following protocol she shut the door behind her, as she had done since the first day of her job. Cole liked to have complete privacy with everything he did. Whether it was dictating a letter or meeting with a client.

Cole glanced up from his papers and smiled at her as she walked toward his desk. He was ten years older than her, just a couple months shy of being thirty-three, sinisterly handsome, calculating blue eyes, and a boyish smile that softened his features.

He stared at her taking in her appearance that day. Her hair was up in a high pony tail, she wore a white nearly skin tight blouse, dark red skirt that fell to her knees with a slit that came to her mid thigh, and black open toed heels. Cole pushed back from the desk and leaned back in his chair.

"Have a seat."

Instead of sitting where most people would once he gave them permission to sit, which was in the chair across from his desk, she sat where she had been for the last couple months. Making her way around the desk she set her pad of paper and pen on the flat smooth surface and straddled her bosses lap.

The way his sexy body, clad in a thousand dollar suit, pressed against her intimately sent delightful shivers through her. His warm hands clutched at her waist feeling the little surprise she had hidden under her blouse.

"Hmm, what do we have under here?" Cole questioned lustfully.

Liz giggled playfully, tracing his shoulders seductively with her palms. "Why don't you go exploring and find out?" She coyly swept her gaze up his face and to his eyes.

Cole leaned forward and kissed her lips, giving her a taste of what was in store for her that afternoon. "I think I will?" He whispered when he pulled back. If they had been at a hotel room he might have ripped open her blouse sending buttons flying but because she had to still wear it he chose a different approach. One that drove her crazy.

Cole traced a finger up and down the slick opaque buttons of her shirt, when he made it back to the first secured button he expertly worked the button out of the hole. Once it was free he kissed the inch of newly exposed skin.

"You always smell so good." Cole complimented. She had used her lilac lotion more often ever since he mentioned how much he loved the scent.

Liz gasped excitedly when he released another button, revealing the very top part of her breasts and again gently kissed and nipped at the exposed flesh. His hands left the rest of the buttons for the moment, letting the anticipation build in both of them.

Roving his lips sensually over the visible skin on her shoulders and neck, he delicately teased her making her moan. He caressed her sides, squeezed the underside of her breasts, and slowly untucked both sides of her blouse from her skirt.

He returned to the task of unbuttoning her blouse. Cole kissed the area between her breasts before he took in the complete sight of his surprise.

Ever since their affair started she had collected an amazing array of lingerie. Today she picked out one of her new additions, an ivory corset that complimented her skin tone beautifully, and pushed her breasts up to look like those of a Fredrick's of Hollywood™ model.

"This is a very pleasant surprise." His sexy voice rumbled.

Liz grinned wide and played with Cole's jacket. "I thought you might like it."

Cole laughed lowly. "Do you know what I'd like even better?" He grabbed her hips and set her on top of his desk. "As much as I love it on you, I'd love it more on the floor." With a playful growl he began to loosen the ties holding the corset together.

Liz joyfully snickered; keeping the reality that she was doing a very wrong thing far away from her conscious thoughts. Yep, her big secret was she was sleeping with her boss. However that wasn't where the secret ended, nor was it the worst of it. Not only was Cole Turner her boss, he was a demon, and most importantly her cousin Phoebe's fiancée. Nope, her life wasn't complicated at all.

TBC


	2. Chapter 1

Note: Because there are so many 'P' names in Charmed I usually mix up Penny and Patty and which one is which. So for me and anyone else who needs it, Penny is Grams, and Patty is The Charmed Ones Mom.

**Chapter 1 **

After work, Liz went home to her apartment. Normally she'd stop by her cousin's place, Halliwell Manor, but today she just didn't feel up to keeping her mask of normalcy in place in front of Phoebe and her other cousins.

She went about her regular coming home after work routine. Closing the front door behind her she kicked off her heels next to the left of the entrance, crossing to the other side of the room in her stocking feet she turned on her iHome and listened to the sound of 80's rock coming from the speakers.

Liz made her way into the kitchen and poured a half a glass of red wine. She didn't have many vices, besides sleeping with Cole, but she loved having a single glass of wine after a busy work day.

As she walked back out of the kitchen and sat on the sofa she couldn't stop the guilt that weighed heavily on her soul. Sleeping with Phoebe's fiancée was one of the worst things she had ever done in her twenty three years on this earth. Sure she's had moments she wasn't proud of in the past, but nothing like this.

She honestly didn't know how it all started; she didn't know how she would get out of it when the time came. If she had stayed in Roswell none of this would have been an issue. She would have eventually met her cousins of course but she wouldn't have taken the secretary job Cole offered her and she certainly wouldn't be with Cole now.

Maybe if her parents had told her earlier about magic and witches and demons she wouldn't have run to San Francisco in search of cousins who didn't even know she existed. Mom, it turned out, was the great-granddaughter of Philippa Warren and Redmond Baxter. They were Penny Halliwell's grandparents.

Philippa and Redmond had two children, one girl, Priscilla, and one boy, Mason, but because it was believed that the magical line passed down through the females, Mason Baxter, their son had no idea that his children or any other future generations would get any magical abilities. Something that he was grateful for.

Mason Baxter had two sons; Derik and Eric, with his wife Mary, neither of them had powers and grew up completely normal and mostly unaware of magic. Mom's Uncle Derik married but didn't have any children. While Grandpa Eric, Mom's Dad, married Jennifer Roland and they had Nancy, who was the first generation from Mason's lineage to exhibit powers.

Mom had the ability of premonitions. However because the magical information from their line was passed down through Mason's sister, Mom had zero idea about what was going on and kept her magic a secret from everyone, including her family.

She would help innocents when she could but she hadn't followed every premonition she had until her sophomore year of college when the Elders finally sent a whitelighter to help her and teach her about the craft and her family line.

Mom fought demons and helped innocents for four years until she met Dad. As far as she knew, Mom completely stopped fighting demons after that. Liz didn't know why she stopped, Mom, even after telling Liz about magic and all the other supernatural things, hadn't told her the reason for quitting the demon fighting biz.

For years Liz never knew about witches, demons, whitelighters, or anything magical besides the crap she saw on TV. Then the aliens came into her life, odd huh, how aliens could open the door that her mother had kept firmly closed for sixteen years.

Maria would call it fate that her destiny must be so amazing that fate stepped in and put her in front of that bullet so Max could heal her and remove the spell her mother cast. Despite Liz's knowledge of magic, she just thought it was coincidence.

The way Max's healing ability worked was when he connected with the injured party he healed what was wrong or broken or foreign. With the spell suppressing a perfectly natural and genetic side of her Max felt something was wrong and removed the block and it brought forth everything.

She hadn't felt much different for a few days after that, anything odd that she felt she brushed off and attributed it Max's healing. However it didn't take long for Liz to realize that things she was noticing couldn't be connected to Max or the aliens at all.

Objects that she was looking for would suddenly be next to her; at first she could shrug it off and think her eyes just passed over it. However it started happening more than mere coincidence could explain away. Then one day she saw absolute proof that she was different.

Running late for school she'd been searching her bedroom for her house keys. She heard Maria getting impatient from the living room, calling at her to hurry up when out of the corner of her eye she saw the pair of jeans she wore yesterday floating in the air. It jerked in the air a couple times and out popped her keys, the keys then proceeded to float toward her and dangle in the air in front of her face until she grabbed them. It didn't take her long to seek out and question Max about what he and the other aliens could do but none of the powers he mentioned were anything like what she did in her room.

Tired of sitting still Liz finished up her wine and stood up from the couch. She'd been immobile for too long, her hands were itching to make a new potion to put in her Book of Shadows. Liz went to her bedroom and pulled out the book. It has always been a thick book but the majority of the pages had been blank when she got it from her mother.

Setting the book on the bed she opted to make herself more comfortable and get out of her work clothes before starting. She made quick work of her blouse and tossed it in her laundry basket. Walking over to her dresser drawer she didn't notice the blue glowing orbs coming in behind her.

"No time to explain, the sisters need you." A familiar voice spoke as he touched her shoulder and orbed her to the Halliwell Manor, still dressed in her skirt and her corset undergarment.

TBC

Note: Next chapter will be posted a couple days after Halloween.


	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

It took mere moments to arrive at the Halliwell Manor. Liz's whitelighter, Chris, orbed them into the living room. A familiar shout reached her ears and a second later Prue came flying out of the conservatory.

"Ow." She rolled over and spotted Liz. "Warlock, blinking, and way too fast." Prue laid out the situation quickly.

"Gotcha." The sisters couldn't freeze, blow up, kick box, or move the warlock if they couldn't catch him.

Liz ran into the room Prue flew out of. Leo, Cole, and her two other cousins were darting this way and that trying to keep away from the blinking warlock while trying their best to capture him in some way.

Phoebe, who spotted Liz, yelled out. "Crystal cage!" And pointed at the crystals on the floor.

The warlock blinked in behind Phoebe and punched her in the back of the head. A chorus of 'Phoebe's' sounded throughout the conservatory. In that moment Liz got a good look at the warlock a second before he blinked away again.

Concentrating she focused on his image, her powers were an off-shoot of Prue's. She could move things with her mind but she needed to have an image of it in her head and then once she had a picture she could concentrate on it and move it to where she wanted it. In this case, the crystal cage the sisters set up. It was basically the good version of a warlocks blinking power.

The warlock suddenly appeared inside the cage, he darted his head back and forth confused by how he got there, and while distracted, Piper shut it with a final crystal closing the cage. Piper, pleased with the job Liz did, taunted the warlock in the cage. "Hmm, didn't count on that power did ya?"

Prue helped Phoebe up and they along with Piper said the vanquishing spell. Fire sprouted from his feet and quickly covered his entire body until there was nothing left but a smoking pile of ash. "Now that's a vanquish." Prue smirked.

"Is everyone ok?" Liz took in everyone, visually checking them over for injuries.

"Oh yea, nothing a few ice packs won't cure." Phoebe brushed off. It was then she got a real good look at Liz's outfit. "Um, did we interrupt something?" Suddenly all eyes were on her.

Liz stared down at her clothes; she glanced up, a blush creeping onto her cheeks, and immediately sought out Cole's gaze just barely catching his quick intake of breath. It took a lot of willpower to tear her stare away from him and look at the other people. "Not really. Chris orbed me while I was changing out of my work clothes."

"You go to work in a corset?" Prue teased. "I mean who hasn't once or twice or a lot more than that, but usually it's for a reason."

If she had been a normal girl with zero ties to aliens or the supernatural Prue's teasing would have flustered her and she'd be babbling about everything but her corset. However she was not a normal girl, a fact she had both cursed and praised, many times in the same moment. This time though—definite blessing.

"Under my blouse, yes I wear a corset." Thank God she still had her skirt on or they'd see the matching ivory white garter belts that Cole paid particular attention to once he removed the skirt. She could still feel the whisker burns from Cole on her inner and upper thighs. "There's a cute guy who works at Cole's firm and he's been showing an interest."

"Ooo, a guy huh?" Phoebe smiled at her. "And from the look of your underwear you reciprocate his interest."

"Enough to put on a corset." She teased right back. That's right Liz, keep it light, keep it teasing, she repeated over and over in her head. Liz wasn't lying, exactly; there was a guy, Trent Lacane, who worked at the office, who had been trying to get her to go to lunch with him for some time. So far she hadn't said yes, it felt wrong to go with someone else while sleeping with Cole. Although since he's still engaged to Phoebe he doesn't seem to have that same problem.

Cole's gaze narrowed at Liz. What guy was she talking about? Cole started making a list of the guys that he'd seen around Liz over the last few months. Theo, Jack, Trent, Quincy…there were a lot. Of course there were a lot, Liz was his secretary and constantly gave paperwork and anything else from him to other people around the office.

"Which guy?" Cole questioned.

Phoebe gave him a curious expression but he saw she didn't suspect anything out of the ordinary. She thought he was just asking out of brotherly concern.

Liz licked her lips and crossed her arms unaware that she pushed her breasts up more than they had been before. "I'm not telling you that."

"Why not?" He took a couple steps closer to her.

Liz glared up at him, "Why do you think? The last guy I mentioned to you, you scared him so bad that he changed his number and moved out of the city."

Cole smirked, Liz wasn't exaggerating either. Phoebe had set Liz up with a colleague of hers at the paper. At that time he and Liz hadn't been sleeping together but it was only a matter of time, a very short time as it turned out.

They had already been dancing around each other. They would pick fights about stupid things just so they could get into each others personal space. At work he would lean closer to her than he should, Liz would find opportunities to hug him and when ever they touched, on purpose or accidently, they would both feel a spark. He'd been around the block long enough to know that eventually they would end up in bed. It just took scaring off her latest date to get them there.

"Well I won't do that this time." He used his height to his advantage, trying to intimidate her while, at the same time, getting a wonderful view of her supple cleavage.

Liz took one step close to him. "Some how Cole, I doubt that."

Prue seeing that this could result in an hour long argument separated the two of them and told them to shelve the boyfriend discussion till later. "Fine. You'll tell me his name eventually." Cole predicted.

Clearing her throat Liz turned to Piper. "So what was the deal with Mr. Blinks A Lot?"

"Same old, same old. Innocent needed saving, warlock got pissed we interfered and the warlock comes after us for payback and trashes us and the house." Piper grumbled. "Have you eaten dinner yet?" She rapidly changed the subject as she was known to do often.

"No, not yet, but I ordered a pizza and it should be arriving in twenty minutes." Again, another lie, she just didn't feel like spending dinner with the girls. A vanquish she didn't mind but sharing a meal, that would be too much for her to deal with right then.

"I'll take you back to your apartment." Chris offered.

Liz was about to nod in agreement when Cole shook his head negatively.

"No, I'll take her home."

Liz scoffed, "I'm not telling you anything Cole. It's none of your business." She moved over toward Chris and got ready for him to orb them.

"I just want to talk to you and you know how stubborn I am." Cole argued.

Sighing Liz quickly weighed the advantages and disadvantages to continue arguing with him. If she continued it could raise Phoebe's suspicions, yes although she and Cole bickered often there was a point of too much to be completely innocent and he'd eventually shimmer in anyway when the coast was clear. If she gave in to Cole now she could send him on his way probably quicker and then she could relax…maybe for the rest of the night and just be alone.

"Fine. Let's get this talk over with." She relented.

"Knew you would see it my way." He grinned. Before shimmering out with her he looked to Phoebe but didn't get closer to her. "I'll be back later."

"Ok, you take care of her." Phoebe smiled warmly but with reservations.

As if Liz didn't feel bad enough about the whole Cole affair. Now, as usual, Phoebe had to go be worried about her well being. She had complete faith in Liz and Cole that nothing inappropriate was happening. Cole came over to left her side, nodded his goodbye to the other sisters and shimmered them to her apartment.

TBC


	4. Chapter 3

Note: Sorry this took a while to get out. Mostly the issue with this chapter was that I had no idea how I wanted the apartment scene to play out. I wrote Cole and Liz being angry and argumentative, happy and jumping right into bed, sad and avoiding issues, cute and teasing, until finally I wrote what I ended up being happy with.

**Chapter 3**

_Halliwell Manor_

Once Liz and Cole shimmered from the manor Prue turned to Phoebe who deflated a bit with their departure. "Things aren't better?"

Leo and Chris, realizing that this was a conversation for the sisters backed out of the room quietly. If they needed them they'd call.

Phoebe shook her head. "No. It's so hard Prue. Cole and I have been through so much. First he was a demon, then he was a demon who was trying to be good but it was getting to be so hard for him and for us." She rubbed her forehead, her sisters knew all this but it helped her to say it all out loud. "When he became completely human our relationship was at its best. Even though we've been engaged for three and half years our love was always there, we had obstacles that stalled the marriage plans but the love got us through."

"And now?" Piper asked.

"Now, he's a demon again. Cole loves that he has powers and is back to what he was but I'm frightened of what might happen. To us, to him…to our relationship. We're already arguing so much because of this." She and her sisters sat down on the couch.

"He's been a demon for the last six months Phoebe. So far there hasn't been anything to indicate that he's evil or going to become evil again." Piper pointed out. She understood Phoebe's concern but clearly Cole wasn't a danger. There would have been some kind of sign in the last few months.

"It doesn't change the fact that he's a demon again. I love Cole, I do, but I don't love Balthazar." Phoebe lowered her eyes so as not to see her sister's expressions. She knew what they were thinking. She'd been thinking it too.

"Sweetie—" Prue started.

Phoebe raised her gaze then. "I know. I should love Cole completely, his human half and his demon half. But I don't…or I can't."

"We understand honey." Piper held Phoebe close, giving her comfort. "If you don't love the demon side, then you don't. But is that fair to Cole or you?"

"It's not just the demon thing anymore though. We don't talk. I ask him about his day and he says 'fine'. I can't tell you how many times I go to sleep and he's not there, I wake up and he's not there. The only time he touches me now is when I initiate it and even then it's nothing more than a quick peck on the lips or cheek or a barely there hug. I don't know what to do anymore."

Prue stared at Phoebe closely, analyzing every nuance of her expression. "Is there something else Pheebs?" She asked softly.

Phoebe played with her fingers. "I think Cole is seeing someone else." She whispered as tears started rolling down her cheeks. Saying it out loud, to her sisters, made the statement so much more powerful. It made it real.

_Liz's Apartment_

For a few moments after shimmering in neither Liz nor Cole said anything. The two just stood in her living room holding each other, reacquainting themselves with the other, and assuring themselves both were ok after their warlock battle.

"Are you ok?" Cole finally asked.

His warm breath fanned against her hair and a small smirk hitched on her lips. "Yea, I'm fine. The warlock didn't even get near me."

Cole shook his head negatively. "No, not that. I know you're ok from that. I kept my eyes on you practically the whole time." He admitted. "I mean today, as you were leaving work there was something in your eyes, like you were sad."

"Oh, that." She took a deep breath, leaning back slightly to look up at him. "Yea, I guess a little."

"Why?" Cole caressed her upper arms, continuing to cradle her in his embrace, giving her the right amount of comfort she needed. "Is everything all right?"

She could tell him the truth about everything weighing on her mind; it mostly involved him and their affair. How long could it continue? Did Cole feel something for her besides lust? Would they tell Phoebe or just let the affair die quietly? She could start asking him all those questions and more that zoomed through her head on a regular basis but she didn't think she was ready to delve into that yet. She wasn't ready for the answers he might give. She wasn't ready for this to end.

So instead of telling Cole what weighed most on her mind, she told him her second most concern. "Everything's ok. I just got an e-mail from Alex; he's been a little heartbroken lately. With Isabel getting married next month to Jesse and having his two best friends in San Francisco while he's dealing with that…it's been kind of hard on him."

Alex had been in love with Isabel for years. The two also dated for nearly a year during his junior year and Isabel's senior year. They continued to date a bit into his senior year but Isabel broke up with him a couple months into her freshmen year of college. Alex was crushed.

Although it became a bit awkward, especially at alien meetings, the two remained friendly with each other and tried to keep their relationship, or lack thereof, away from the group as much as possible. She knew Alex had been hoping to get back together with Isabel, he even asked once if that was a possibility. Isabel, thankfully, hadn't strung Alex along and told him that she didn't see that happening for a while, if ever.

Now Alex didn't stay home and mope over Isabel but it was clear he wasn't seriously dating. Then a year and a half ago Isabel met and fell in love with Jesse Ramirez. It was a whirlwind romance that had Isabel and Jesse engaged after six months and planning a wedding that would take place next month.

Cole took her hand and led her to the couch. "I know you got an invitation to the wedding, are you planning on going?"

Liz put her legs over Cole's and he draped one arm over her legs cupping her thigh and the other curled around her back. "I don't know. Yes, Isabel is my friend but Alex is my best friend. I'm kind of leaning towards going if Alex goes to give him support, but if he doesn't want to go then having him, Maria, and I have a fun night out. Maybe take him to P3 and try to keep his mind off it."

"I'm sure he'd like that." Cole pushed a brunette lock of hair behind her right ear. "When is he coming here?"

"In two weeks. The band scheduled a few gigs in Roswell, Seattle, Portland, and a few down in L.A., then after that he's free for a few weeks." She smiled widely at Cole happy that Alex was going to be coming to San Francisco and staying with her while he visited. They had managed to see each other a few times a year over her five years away from Roswell.

The two were silent for a few moments and then Cole asked. "Who's the guy?"

Liz didn't try to play dumb; she knew which guy he was asking about. "It's really no one Cole, just someone who has asked me out once or twice at the office."

Cole cupped the back of her neck and gently played with the fine baby hairs back there. "When I find out who he is I'm firing him." He said it in a teasing way but with a hint of seriousness that made Liz question whether he would or not.

Instead of getting angry or indignant she laughed lowly. "Trust me Cole." Liz lifted her body onto his lap fully. "There is only one man at the office that I want." She leaned in whispering softly. "There is only one man that I wore this outfit for." She bit his ear as Cole slid his hand up her skirt. "And there is only one man that I've given blow jobs under the desk to."

With a gleam in his eyes and a sexy growl Cole attacked her mouth with wild abandon. Hungry for more Liz met his voraciousness happily.

Kissing down her neck Cole lifted her from his lap and laid her down on the couch and covered her body with his. They made out heavily for several minutes when Cole pulled back. "Allow me to return the favor." His voice husky with desire as he moved down her body with a wicked smirk that told her exactly what was to come.

_The Halliwell Manor_

After a few minutes of crying Phoebe wiped her eyes with the tissues Prue gave her.

"Honey, are you sure?" Piper asked from beside Phoebe. Cole wouldn't cheat on Phoebe, he loved her.

Prue held her youngest sisters hand tightly. "What makes you think he is Pheebs?"

Sniffling Phoebe began to go through the little things that she's noticed. "At first it was Cole not being around. But there was a reason for that; we were fighting about the demon issue. Then I started noticing he was taking about ten more minutes every morning to get ready."

Piper paused for a moment. "Is that some kind code for he was spending more private personal time in the shower?"

Phoebe laughed sarcastically. "No, not that. If he was doing that in the shower with that kind of frequency that would be something I could fix with no problem." She told them with confidence.

"Noted." Prue chuckled.

"What I meant was his usual routine of showering, dressing, combing his hair, shaving, and brushing his teeth all took up to about an hour in the morning. Now he's taking longer to pick out which suit he's going to wear. Which tie it's going to be." Leaning back in the chair she continued. "You know the cufflinks that Dad gave him, with C.T. engraved on them, welcoming him to the family."

"Of course. Dad gave Leo a set too. His obviously with L.W." Piper told the girls.

"Cole doesn't wear them anymore. He use to though, almost all the time. I looked at the ones he's wearing now, he either wears a pair of sterling silver scales of justice, a pair of jeweled owls, or a pair of gold boxing gloves."

"Sweetie I know that all these things look suspicious but so far it seems to be a lot of things that are easily explainable. Maybe he just wanted a change of cufflinks, maybe he's working on some really big cases at the office and maybe that's messing with confidence a little so he's taking that extra time figuring what to wear." Piper came up with plausible explanations for what Phoebe was mentioning.

"Ok, sure. If it was just those things I can see how you'd not think Cole was cheating on me. But it's not all there is." She's gotten this fair, might as well tell them everything. "About a month ago I was separating out shirts of Cole's that I needed to take to the dry cleaners. There was what looked like a lipstick smudge near the fourth button of his work shirt. A week later I saw very faint scratch marks on his shoulder."

"Is that all you've seen so far?" Piper questioned.

"Yes." Phoebe confirmed.

Prue rubbed her little sister's back. "Then what I think you need to do sweetie is not worry about it right now. Even those two things can be explained away. I'm not saying you're wrong, you could very well be right, God knows your insight is usually right on target, but I'd wait till you have some more evidence before you make any decisions."

Phoebe shrugged. "So I should just ignore what I think is going on?" She didn't think she could do that.

"No, I'm not saying ignore it. I'm just saying don't jump to conclusions yet. Look for more clues about what's going on, innocent or not." Prue explained.

Phoebe thought it over for a few moments. "I think I get what you're saying." She pushed back the hair that had fallen in front of her face. "You want me to look for clues like a mad woman until I come up with something solid one way or the other."

Prue nodded. "And we'll help." If Cole was cheating on Phoebe he'd get a beat down so severe he'd wish he were dead.

_Liz's Apartment_

"I don't think this was how Grandma Claudia envisioned me using her favorite quilt." Liz teased lovingly. The quilt in question was currently draped over their naked bodies while they lay on the couch resting after their romp.

Cole kissed her lips. "From what you've told me about her, I wouldn't be surprised if she used this quilt in a similar fashion."

Liz cringed. "Ew, I don't need to picture Grandma Claudia naked, let alone having a sex life and using this quilt to cover up her and her bed buddy." Some images didn't need to be put in her brain.

"It's probably why it's her favorite." Cole teased just to get a reaction from Liz.

"Again, ew." Liz sat up and scrubbed her hands over her face. "I need a brain scrub."

From behind her Cole chuckled. "Or maybe you just need a new image dancing around in your head." He started kissing up her naked back and nuzzling his nose against her shoulder.

It didn't take long for Liz to relax and lean into him again. "Hmm, I like that idea."

Cole trailed his lips across her clavicle and up her neck; he palmed her right breast, teasing her puckered nipple, enjoying the sensual whimpers of pleasure coming from her throat. He captured her lips and brought her down on top of him as they began round two.

TBC


	5. Chapter 4

Note: I've finally figured out what I'm going to do with Cole and Liz besides their relationship and when Phoebe will find everything out. So I'll be starting that in this chapter and it does get a little dark, there will be some abuse mentioned and alluded to but it won't be graphic or front and center. So just be aware of that. Hope everyone enjoys this chapter.

**Chapter 4**

_Next Morning; Phoebe & Cole's Condo_

Phoebe, still lying in bed, waited for the tell-tale signs of Cole leaving for work. Picking up his keys and his brief case, then hearing his shoes walk across carpet then the tile in front of the elevator and finally the generic ding of the elevator reaching their floor and Cole getting into it.

Last night she had stayed up until nearly midnight waiting for Cole to return from taking Liz home. She didn't give the impression she was awake and waiting for him, choosing to feign sleep, but she made note of the time before he entered their bedroom.

However since Cole slept on the couch after arriving home she didn't have to pretend long. After he left that morning she stayed in bed for a moment. Turning around she faced Cole's side of the bed or what use to be his side if he still slept next to her, which he hadn't for a few weeks. Damn, today it had reached more than just a few weeks, it's been two months now since he slept beside her.

Sitting up Phoebe tossed the quilt aside and swung her legs out of bed. She didn't have to go into work till noon, the paper was finishing up the last of the remodeling to the office, the new owner of the paper didn't like the look of the old newspaper room, and they couldn't have the people who worked at the paper getting in the way.

She went about her normal routine, albeit a little slower than normal, coffee, breakfast and finally a shower. When she got out of the shower she donned her large pink terrycloth robe and sat on the unmade bed in her bedroom.

Phoebe didn't know how long she sat there but it couldn't have been long, her coffee was still a bit warm. _Am I really going to do this?_ She thought to herself. Having decided, while in the shower, to snoop through Cole's things. It only took her a moment to answer her silent question. _Absolutely_.

RosCHMDRosCHMDRosCHMDRosCHMD 

_Liz's Apartment_

"I'm late. I'm late. I'm so fucking late." Liz said to an empty room, dressed in only her underwear and bra, with a blue terry cloth towel on her head, as she ran toward the bathroom.

Last night, after Cole left, she completely forgot to set her alarm to wake her up at her normal four-thirty. It drove her bonkers to be late, guess it's a good thing she's sleeping with the boss. His form of punishment would be much more pleasurable than other employers.

Unraveling her hair from the towel Liz scrubbed her almost black wet hair. As it dried it would lighten up to her normal dark brown but until then it'd stay black. Not for the first time she wondered what she would look like with midnight black hair but she quickly tossed that thought aside. Phoebe was currently sporting a short black hairstyle and the last thing she wanted was to remind Cole of Phoebe when he was with her.

Frustrated Liz tossed the towel on the bathroom floor. All she'd have time for would be a quick blow dry and then she'd put her hair up in a pony tail, no time to do anything fancy. This was one of the few times she wished to be evil, then she could use personal gain spells without consequences. Unfortunately if she dared use a spell to dry and style her hair it would most likely make her hair fall out or turn some weird unnatural color, no thank you.

Next she hurried through her make-up routine, and then rushed through the hallway and down to her bedroom. Grabbing a dress from the closet she set it flat on the bed. She put on nude thigh highs, picked up which heels she'd wear, and then went back to her dress.

As she stepped one leg into the opening of the dress, she heard a shimmer behind her and then— "You're late."

"Tell me something I don't know." Liz chuckled

"You're gorgeous." Cole rumbled sexily behind her.

Smirking, she tossed Cole an amused glance over her shoulder. "I said something I don't know." She winked and lifted the straps of her dress up onto her shoulders. Before she could ask Cole to zip her up, he came up behind her and eased his hands into the opening of her dress and lightly touched her stomach with his warm hands.

Cole kissed the nape of her neck as he gently explored her torso. The two cuddled and kissed for a few moments enjoying the quiet together, until they both looked at her bedside clock and the rush to get to work hit them again.

Grabbing her things Liz hurried out her front door with Cole following close behind. As usual they kissed goodbye quickly when they got to the garage floor and then split off getting into their cars; they rarely went to work in the same car together. Within a minute they were on the road, headed toward Cole's office.

RosCHMDRosCHMDRosCHMDRosCHMD 

_Underworld_

"Well?" A sultry feminine voice questioned the trembling minion standing in front of her desk.

"I have what you asked for." His voice shook. In the human world he would be feared for his size alone. However his physical appearance meant almost nothing when it came to full blooded demons like his mistress in front of him. Although the demonic minion stood at a towering six foot four and had sculpted muscles that would make humans pause and think twice about having a confrontation with him, demonically he was weak. His mother was fully human and his father had only a third of a low-level tracker demon.

His mistress, Talinia or Tally, turned around in her chair and took the outstretched file from his hands. "This is who he spends his time with?" She traced the photo of the young woman.

"Yes. He has been seen with her quite a bit." He had taken the photos of Belthazor with all the people he was in constant contact with. His fiancée, his employees, the people who work beside him, his fiancée's family, and anyone who had spent more than a few spare minutes with. One person that started popping up more often than the fiancée was his secretary and fiancée's cousin.

"Well, it seems Belthazor has been a naughty demon." Tally laughed cruelly. Her shoulder length blonde hair glittered in the firelight from the torches around the office.

"What would you like me to do?"

Tally paused and leaned back, taking in the disappointingly human male in front of her. "Same thing you're doing now. I want more pictures and information. Anything and everything, especially more pictures of this woman and Belthazor together." She held up the picture of the fiancée's cousin.

"Yes mistress." Mark stood stock still, Talinia hadn't dismissed him yet, he knew if he left before that there would be more hell to pay.

Tally stared at him coolly. "You know what I require human." It was an insult to a demon, even one as minor as Mark to be called 'human'.

He fought with himself to not clench his teeth. Any show of anger wouldn't be good for him, at least not in front of his mistress. "Yes mistress." As he had done hundreds of times before he stripped out of his clothes, tossing them to the side. He then made his way to behind her desk and got on his knees in front of her.

She ran a sharpened nail down his chiseled cheek and smirked evilly. "That's a good boy." Tally brought her legs up and draped them over his shoulders. "You know what I want. Earn your keep."

He nodded, took a deep breath, and did as she demanded.

TBC


	6. Chapter 5

Note: Thank you for the great feedback. Have 3 chapters to put up today. Next up, this chapter kind of got away from me, Isabel and Liz had more to say then I original thought. Plus there is something at the end that just kind of cropped up as I was writing, I wasn't going to reveal this until a later chapter and in a different way but this came about as I wrote and I really liked it and I hope no one minds where I went with it. I hope everyone enjoys this chapter.

**Chapter 5**

_Phoebe and Cole's Condo_

Angrily Phoebe slammed shut the dresser drawer. Nothing. She searched for an hour and didn't find one thing that screamed affair. That should make her happy, it should mean there was nothing to find, hence no affair going on. But she knew something was going on. She could feel it in her gut like a premonition that wouldn't come.

Seeing the time she dropped her robe and hurried to get dressed. She had to be at the paper in an hour. She'd deal with the possibility of Cole having an affair later when she wasn't thinking about her reader's problems and the solution to those problems. It was so much easier to give strangers advice then it was to give advice to yourself.

_Law Offices of Taylor and Hitch_

That morning had been insanely busy with three cases Cole had lined up that morning; one after the other, Liz hardly had time for a sip of water on the go, let alone take a lunch. She had been running documents, making phone calls and anything Cole needed done.

Around 1:30 that afternoon she finally got an hour break. Cole was still in court and would be for at least another thirty minutes but Leslie, another secretary in the office, was able to fill in.

When she got back to her desk, she pulled out her turkey club sandwich, chips, and water and settled into her chair. The feeling of food hitting her empty stomach was enough to make her moan.

As she worked her way through her lunch she checked her cell phone for messages. She had three, one from Piper, asking her to come for dinner that weekend, another from the dry cleaner saying her clothes were ready to be picked up and then one from Isabel Evans.

Biting the bullet she called up her sort of friend, Liz had an idea of what this phone call was about. She got confirmation when Isabel answered the phone.

"You haven't RSVP'd yet." Isabel didn't say 'hi' but jumped right to the chase.

Liz sighed. "I know. I'm sorry I should have called you sooner."

"So is that a 'yes'? I can mark you and a plus one down? Since you're so late letting me know you're going to be at one of the middle or back tables."

The sound of Isabel typing on something could be heard and Liz sat up in her desk. "Isabel wait, that's an 'I don't know'."

Immediately the tapping of keys stopped. "What do you mean you don't know?" There was a pause and then Isabel let out a deep breath. "It's because of Alex isn't it?"

"Yes." There was no point in beating around the bush. If Alex didn't want to go there would be slim chance of her going either.

"Well at least you didn't laugh at me and tell me how much of a bitch I am." She laughed but it was clear there wasn't a trace of humor in it.

Liz grimaced, although Isabel couldn't see her through the phone. "Maria cares about you Isabel you know that."

Maria told her about the phone call between her and Isabel. It wasn't a pleasant one. Maria's fiercely protective of Alex, always had been. While Liz was protective of him too, of all her friends and family, she didn't feel the need to make Isabel feel worse than she already did.

"I know but she hates me for how I hurt Alex. Can't say I blame her."

"Isabel nobody blames you for falling in love with Jesse. He's a nice guy who you clicked with, there's nothing wrong with that." Granted she only met him a total of two times, but both times he was a sweet guy and very much in love with Isabel.

Liz leaned back in her swivel chair, maybe she should be harder on Isabel than she was but she couldn't be. Isabel fell in love with Jesse who was single and so was she, just because everyone thought Isabel and Alex would work it out didn't mean it was wrong that she got with Jesse. You can't help who you fall in love with.

As she had found out the hard way. If Liz had any smarts at all she would have high-tailed it out of San Francisco the second she saw Cole. The minute she locked eyes on him she wanted him. Only problem was at that time he had been with Phoebe for nearly a year. It wasn't the ideal way to meet the man she…immediately she halted that thought. She didn't want to finish where that trail led; she knew what she felt but maybe if she didn't think it she could continue denying it for a little while.

There was a moment of silence over the phone, Liz could practically see Isabel's gears turning, trying to come up with a solution. When finally Isabel sighed. "Ok, how about I put you, Alex, and Maria down with plus ones for now but let me know a week before the wedding, that's the final day I can make any changes on the head count."

"Ok, thanks Isabel. I'll let you know by then." Liz promised. "So, since I have you on the phone, how is everyone else doing?"

"Good, everyone's good." Isabel vaguely stated.

"Do you have a more detailed run down of things?" Liz chuckled good naturedly.

"I'm sorry, you're right, it's just Max has been annoyingly firm about being closed lipped with you, Maria, and Alex since you guys left Roswell." Isabel explained.

Liz nodded. "I get it." Max had been less than thrilled about her moving to San Francisco two years after their high school graduation. Nor was he pleased about Alex going on music gigs around the country, and Maria going to LA to work on her singing career.

Max couldn't let go that three of the core people in their 'I Know an Alien Club' had left Roswell. He didn't want any one to leave the city for an extended period of time, he gave every reason under the sun why, from he wouldn't be able to protect them from far away to he couldn't rely on them for help if needed, and the stupidest reason of all was how would he be able to trust they wouldn't spill the Royal Four's secret when they weren't there, that pissed them all off. If they hadn't spread the news at that point, they weren't going to just because they weren't in town.

"Is there anything you can tell me?" She at least wanted to know everyone was ok and more importantly safe and happy.

"Max and Michael finally came around with Jesse. The two had been cold to him since I told them about the engagement, neither of them liked Jesse because they thought he was too old for me, he's only four years older. Which is less of an age difference then Max and the girl he's seeing right now. She's a freshmen up at Las Cruses College, only turned eighteen four months ago and he's down my throat at Jesse and my age difference." Isabel scoffed at her brother's double standard.

Liz shook her head, yea that sounded like Max. He was a good guy but he definitely had some flaws, having a double standard about certain things, a big flaw. One that bothered everyone he was close too.

"How about Michael?" Liz took a sip of water. She knew Michael still worked at the Crashdown but now instead of a cook he was a part time manager on his way to being a full time manager.

"Still working at the Crashdown, still working nights at MetaChem. He's been dating but nothing serious as far as I can tell. He's too afraid of getting hurt again." A bit of iciness snuck into Isabel's tone.

Maria and Michael dated on and off until a couple years after graduation. But when Maria left to go to LA and work on her singing career, they broke up, for good. Maria met someone on one of her visits to San Francisco to see Liz and the rest was history. Maria was now dating Chris, Liz's whitelighter. The two have dated for a year and a half, after dancing around each other for six month before that.

Liz cringed. "Maria regrets hurting Michael—"

"And why is she so pissed at me for hurting Alex, when she went right ahead and hurt Michael. The way Michael found out she was seeing someone else was when she brought her boyfriend here to meet Amy. She couldn't give him a warning?" She vented.

"Too be fair she thought Michael was already seeing someone. The couple times she talked to Michael he said he was happily dating. She took him at face value." Liz argued.

"Since when does Michael tell the truth about painful subjects? He lied about Hank hurting him for years. Of course he'd lie about being alone. Maria should have seen right through that."

"Ok but I think that's asking too much. Is Maria supposed to second guess everything Michael says, analyze every sentence to see if he's saving face?" She countered.

Isabel stayed silent for a bit, almost long enough that Liz thought the connection dropped, when finally she spoke. "Fine, maybe she can't do that. But at least I told Alex that we didn't have a future together. I was clear and straightforward, she shouldn't be so mad at me when she did worse to Michael."

"Yes you were clear with Alex. But Alex and Maria are like siblings. They're like you and Michael. No matter how right or how wrong one of them is you're going to have each other's backs." With that Liz noticed the time. "Crap. I'm sorry Isabel I've got to go, my lunch break is nearly over. I'll call you later. Take care."

"Ok, bye. Don't work too hard."

"Too late." Both women hung up. Liz threw out her lunch garbage, opened up a letter she'd been composing and went through final revisions.

No sooner had she started when Cole strode up to her desk. "My office." He sternly said heading toward his office without a reply from her.

This wasn't the first time, nor the last time, Cole would speak curtly to her after a difficult case. Especially one it looked like he might lose. Standing up she put her computer on hibernate and hurried through the thick, soundproof, dark wooden door.

Shutting the door behind her Liz found herself pushed against it, Cole's lips on hers, and his hands pushing up her skirt. "Bad case?" She breathlessly got out, her eye lids fluttered at the kisses he rained on her neck, enjoying every moment of his warm hands on her. She loved times like this, when he was fiery and angry and all he wanted was to be inside her.

Tightening her legs around his waist she held on as those hands caressed up her body. "Yes." His voice rough from frustration. Liz pushed his grey suit jacket off his shoulders and it fell to the floor with a soft thump. Clothes were being pulled off at rapid speed, Cole desperate to feel her skin against his.

His case from earlier wasn't going his way. It made him want to throw energy balls at the judge and the defense attorney. Since he couldn't do that and still remain a good guy he got his frustration out another way. A better way.

Pulling her away from the door Cole carried her nearly naked body over to the leather couch. The leather creaked beneath her, Liz moaned when he licked and sucked on her neck. He growled with pleasure, unable to stop Belthazor from surfacing a bit.

Liz saw he was trying to hold back his baser instincts. Breathing heavily she placed her hands on his cheeks. "Don't do that." She begged him.

"Don't do what?" He struggled to speak past the desire and Belthazor.

"You don't have to hide him from me. He's a part of you." She nuzzled his nose. "If he wants to come out it's ok." She assured him.

"I don't want to scare you."

Liz kissed him softly. "If he hasn't scared me before, then he won't scare me now." She'd seen Belthazor before, even kissed him before. Cole was still so worried that she'd have a similar reaction to Phoebe when Belthazor came out, which was disgust. Phoebe never, unless she was under a spell, wanted to see or be around Cole's demon side. Liz on the other hand had never had that reaction to him and she couldn't ever see having that kind of reaction.

Belthazor, despite his different appearance, was still Cole. Was still the man Liz loved and she couldn't imagine shrinking away in horror at his touch or demanding the nicer looking version of Cole show himself at all times. It'd be like Cole asking her to never show her magic side to him, it's a side that he's been taught to hate but he'd never tell her she was horrible or disgusting for showing it.

Throwing his head back Cole roared, thank the gods for that soundproofing around his office, Liz mused. Right before her eyes he grew taller, broader, and his skin burst out in colors of red and black. His hands, which cupped her bare breasts turned red and formed steel hard sharp fingernails.

Liz caressed his naked chest, comforting him through the quick transformation. "It's ok baby." Belthazor lowered his head and stared at her. His eyes were black as coal and his teeth razor sharp. He took in her tanned legs wrapped around him, her soft hands tenderly stroking his chest and arms, and the look of lust she still showed him.

He remained still. "Are you sure?" He growled out through clenched teeth, giving her one last chance to back out.

Sitting up as best she could, she stared directly into his eyes, that despite their evil tint held a warmth when staring back. Leaning in she carefully kissed his lips, aware of his knife like teeth. She wrapped her arms around his broad shoulders pressing her chest into his. "I'm sure." She assured him.

With a satisfied rumble Belthazor gathered her close; even more eager to go where she and Cole were headed. Belthazor and later back in his Cole form showed her how they felt about her for the next hour and a half.

TBC

Side Note/End Chapter Note: The original scene that I had Liz show she accepts the Belthazor side of Cole will still be in this story just with some minor changes.


	7. Chapter 6

Note: Another chapter that got away from me. The characters didn't really want to follow what I had in mind but after I finished writing what they wanted I have to admit that they knew better.

Couple of quick things that I don't think I mentioned and probably won't mention in future chapters, Phoebe doesn't have her empath power yet, Wyatt is born but Chris is not Piper and Leo's son, he's just a whitelighter-witch that came to the past/present to save Wyatt from turning evil and creating the crappy future he lived in. When he & it was saved Chris decided to stay in this time period and stay with Maria while being a whitelighter to Liz and few other charges. And this fic is set in Season 7 with some changes and without the Avatars.

**Chapter 6**

_Three Days Later; Underworld_

"You have more pictures, yes?" Talinia filed to a sharp point her index finger talon. It required so much work keeping ones talons sharp and lethal. Centuries ago she had to use rocks and the side of brick buildings to sharpen them. Occasionally she still used those methods but most home knife sharpeners did the trick.

Mark nodded and set an envelope on her desk. "Yes."

Talinia set her sharpener aside and withdrew the photos. "Interesting. How did you take these?" The pictures were taken from inside Belthazor's office. She knew Mark couldn't become invisible so how did he manage to get these?

"While he was out of the office I planted two small cameras, one on his desk, and another in the fake potted tree by the bookcase. They only last two hours and are only about to take one hundred pictures each but I got lucky this day. I put them there before but didn't get much of anything." He explained.

Talinia leaned back in her chair and smiled. "So the little witch likes the demon side too." In the photo she couldn't see much of the secretary, just her legs and one of her hands. Belthazor's red and black back kept the rest of her out of view.

"Yes mistress. There is a picture a little further down that gives you a look of her face. For most of the act with Belthazor she had her face turned toward the door, looking at him, or hidden by his face but for a few frames she turned toward the desk."

Tally flipped through them finding the picture he referred too. "Hmm." The secretary, Liz, she believed her name was clearly enjoyed what the demon was doing. Quickly going through the remaining pictures she pulled out ten photos. "Put these in the folder to send to the youngest Halliwell, Phoebe."

"Did you want me to send them mistress?" Mark asked.

"Did I say to send them yet?" She glared at him.

Quickly he shook his head. "No mistress. I apologize." He lowered his gaze and stared hard at the desk.

Talinia stood up from her chair, sauntering over to the tall human, not demon enough to be called a demon. She gently pressed her sharp talon fingernails against his chest, not pushing hard enough to draw blood but hard enough to put an impression into his skin.

"I apologize for speaking out of turn mistress." He silently begged for her forgiveness hoping she wouldn't consider his question an act of defiance.

"Yes, I'm sure you are sorry." She murmured running her fingers along the grooves and dips on his torso. If she had the time she'd punish him proper for his question, unfortunately she had meetings that couldn't be postponed. "Go and get close to the secretary witch. Get Belthazor jealous of your proximity. Later I'll give you more to do but for now that is all."

"Yes mistress." Mark let out a sigh and left her presence.

_Phoebe & Cole's Penthouse; 9:30 p.m._

It was time. He had to end it.

He didn't know why he hadn't come to the conclusion sooner but finally he realized that he couldn't go on the he had been.

Cole leaned against one of the pillars in the penthouse he owned with Phoebe. This place…he hadn't thought of it as a home for nearly a year now.

The penthouse had been the symbol everything he wanted or thought he wanted. Success, power, and prestige. Plus the added benefit of finally winning Phoebe. This penthouse and everything it represented should have been enough, but it wasn't.

Liz came into his orbit and suddenly he saw what he was missing. He loved Phoebe, he still loved her but it wasn't the in love kind of love that he needed or should feel for her. With Liz though…there was instant attraction, as there had been with Phoebe, but what only started to set them apart was Liz's lack of fear whenever Belthazor surfaced.

He'd "Hulk out", as Liz was fond of saying, and instead of gasping or backing away in fear Liz would look at him the same way she would when he was Cole. After a demon attacked in the attic he hadn't been able to calm down as quickly as he normally did and Belthazor stayed out. Phoebe, Piper, and Prue gave him a wide berth; one always had their eye on him. Liz on the other hand, she started teasing him and asking him questions. She asked how Belthazor had a different outfit on than Cole when he transformed, asked him if he ever split his pants when transforming because he was larger than Cole, and then she nudged him playfully while smiling at him. Nobody had ever done that before, as Belthazor or Cole. It was then he began to look passed his initial attraction and start to seriously consider a relationship with her.

Now he stood in his expensive living room/dining room area alone, hearing nothing from the outside because of the special glass on each window, absolutely nothing from the apartments below, and all he wanted to do was shimmer back to Liz's small four room apartment. He wanted to crawl into bed with her, wrap his arms around her and hold her all night, smelling her hair and feeling her pressed up against his side, listening to the sounds of the ducks quacking from the pond in the park across the street, and the upstairs neighbor hurrying across her floor to grab a midnight snack, a nightly ritual it would seem.

After a long while passed sitting in the dark the elevator bell dinged. Phoebe walked out of the opening doors, unbuttoning her jacket as she moved. "Cole?" The room was dark and she could only see the outline of a man in the moonlight.

"Yes it's me." He flatly told her.

"Why are you standing here in the dark?" Phoebe tossed her jacket on the two thousand dollar chair that had been there since they moved in.

Cole shrugged, "It helps me think sometimes." He turned to face her.

Phoebe didn't step any closer, not willing to come into the room any further than she already had. "Cole? What's wrong? You're scaring me."

Cole dropped his head, "I'm sorry Phoebe I don't mean to scare you." He flicked on the light switch closest to him. The room was suddenly bathed in bright light.

"Ok, so what's up?"

"Maybe you should sit down." Cole suggested.

Phoebe crossed her arms. "No, no. If this is what I think it is I want to stand."

Reluctantly Cole nodded. "All right." He took a deep breath. "You and I both know that we've been—off track for a while now. When we got together we were great and so in love but lately there's clearly something missing between us."

Phoebe glanced down at her shoes and nodded. "We've both been pulling away from each other." She voiced what she knew for months. "But we can work through this. We can." Yes, the possibility that Cole was seeing someone else was now more of a certainty but if they loved each other they could figure it out. It hurt and her heart was broken but she did love him and that had to mean something.

"I think you know we can't." Cole gently told her. Phoebe wasn't a stupid woman, blinded by love sometimes, yes, but never stupid. She had to know he sought out someone else for intimate company.

"There's someone else." It wasn't a question any more. Tears welled up in her eyes but she didn't let them fall. Not yet, not until she was in her sister's arms.

Cole didn't want to tell her that the 'someone else' was Liz but he couldn't lie to her and tell her that there wasn't another woman. "Yes. But even before I turned to her we were already on the rocks. We've been hanging on to this relationship for the wrong reasons Phoebe."

"I still love you Cole."

Cole sadly smiled. "I still love you too but some time during these last few months I stopped being in love with you. Can you honestly tell me that you're still as in love with me as you were when we first got together?"

"Well every relationship goes through ups and downs, every relationship changes. It doesn't mean we should break up." She clasped her hands together and rested them on her chest.

Cole sighed. Besides telling Phoebe that he's in love with Liz, which wasn't an option, at least not until he told Liz first, there was one other way to make her understand where he was coming from. He took a deep breath and brought out Belthazor.

Phoebe gasped and backed away a step. "Cole what are you doing?"

"Do you still love me like this?" He asked his voice deep and rumbling.

"Cole, change back, this is not the time to—" She started.

"NO!" Belthazor roared. "Answer me Phoebe." He stalked up to her and backed her up against the wall; she cringed from him, shutting her eyes and forced calming breaths out until she got the courage to look at him.

Phoebe swallowed roughly. He wouldn't change back until she answered. "No I don't ok. I'm sorry but I don't. I can't love a…" Phoebe snapped her mouth shut. "Please change back." She softly begged.

Cole did as she wanted and returned to his human visage as he backed away from her. "I don't want to hurt you Phoebe, I never did, but staying together would hurt both of us."

She sniffled and pushed away from the wall. "How can—Does she love your demon side? Can you honestly tell me that this other woman does?"

"Yes. She does. And I can."

Anger flared in Phoebe's eyes. "What is she a demon too? Is that why?"

"She's not a demon, she's not evil. And she's never backed away in fear of Belthazor." He saw the hurt in her expression. "Maybe I shouldn't tell you this."

"Tell me, I need to hear you say it."

"She's never looked at me as an evil thing. Whether I'm in human form or demon form she looks at me the same way. She's touched me as a demon and not hesitated or flinched. She's kissed me and not cared what face I wore."

Phoebe clutched at her stomach. "Cole I've kissed you when you were Belthazor too." She pointed out.

"But you were being influenced by evil then."

"So because I want to kiss you and not Belthazor I'm in the wrong?" She argued.

"No, yes, both. Many of our issues stem from your distrust of me and Belthazor and the fact that you hate that side of me." He threw his hands out in frustration. "Maybe if I had stayed human we could have worked through our other remaining issues but my demon just added more to it. It's too much for us to fix."

"Even if I somehow came to accept Belthazor…" She tentatively tested the waters.

He negatively shook his head. "Too much has happened. A year ago I would have said absolutely. Let's try but now I don't want to try."

"We're really breaking up aren't we?" Phoebe closed her eyes. She'd felt this outcome on the horizon. Even suspecting Cole was with someone else didn't stop her from hoping that they could fix everything and be together and happy again.

Cole didn't need to say anything, it would only rub salt in the wound. "Feel free to stay in penthouse as long as you need. It's paid up for the next six months."

Phoebe shook her head. "I'll move back in with my sisters. I don't think I can stay here." Suddenly a horrible thought occurred to her. "Did you and her ever...here?"

"Never here. I promise." Cole quickly assured her.

Phoebe scoffed painfully. "Your promises don't mean much right now Cole."

"I wish there was a way to do this without hurting you. I'm sorry Phoebe." Not knowing what else to say he shimmered out.

Phoebe's face crumpled and the tears she tried so hard to hide flowed freely down her cheeks. She made her way to the couch and sobbed. It was over. Their love, their life together, was no more.

TBC

Next Chapter: Cole goes to see Liz. Phoebe tells her sisters about her and Cole's break up.


	8. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

_Liz's Apartment_

Liz finished the last word of her spell and watched in amazement as her families Book of Shadows took the entry she made and changed her normal handwriting to fancy old lettering. Around the ingredients the two herbs most prevalent in the spell were drawn and the page sketched a Celtic border around the edges of the ancient looking parchment.

"I never get tired of seeing that." She grinned. Liz wondered for the millionth time if there was a spell on the book itself or if a spirit lived inside. With her love of science she wanted to figure it out and do extensive research on it but the magic side of her realized she'd never figure it out scientifically.

Liz closed the book and gathered up her magically supplies. From behind her she heard the tell-tale sound of a shimmer. She quickly turned, knowing demons of all kinds could shimmer in, but just as quickly she calmed once she saw it was Cole. "Hey you. Just finishing up a spell. What are you—," Getting her first good look at him she set down the mandrake root at her lover's expression. "Are you ok?"

Cole smiled at the concern in her voice. "I just broke up with Phoebe."

Liz stood there at the dining room table, silent, frozen. Questions tumbled around in her head at his announcement but only one was the most important. "Are you ok?" She asked again, taking his hand in hers.

He squeezed her hand telling her without words that he was ok but the situation was still painful. "I never wanted to hurt her." He said.

Liz led him over to the couch; she sat and pulled gently on his hand coaxing him to sit. "I know that Cole." She stroked the back of his neck. Despite their on-going affair she knew that Cole would always care about Phoebe, she expected him too with everything they shared over the years. Even though she wasn't dating Max or Kyle anymore they were still in her heart because of the times they shared.

The utter faith Liz showed him would have brought him to his knees if he hadn't all ready been sitting. "Her face when I told her, she was heartbroken. She knew though."

"Knew what? About us?" If Phoebe knew about her and Cole then she was a fantastic actress because Liz never suspected a thing. Her cousin had never treated her different or with hostility.

"Not about us specifically." He pulled Liz closer to him. Cole loved the light touch of comfort she continued to give him. "But she knew or suspected anyway that I was seeing someone else. And I didn't tell her about you just that there was someone else in my life."

"Is there anything you need me to do?" She whispered.

Cole brought his hand up to her cheek and stared at her with such love and devotion that she could hardly breathe. "Just continue being you." He had to tell her. "Thank you for accepting everything I am. Demon and all. I've never had that before. My mother hated my human side, Phoebe hated my demon side, but you accept all of me." He kissed her. "I love you Liz."

Liz's lips slowly curved into a wide happy grin. "Really?" She'd had doubts about whether what Cole felt was love. She knew he cared and worried. Knew he loved having sex with her but she never allowed herself to believe that he actually loved her. "I love you too." She told him.

Returning her grin he lifted her up onto his lap. "So you love me huh?"

Liz tilted her head and sighed dramatically, "I suppose." She teased before she kissed his forehead and continued down to his eyes, his nose, and his cheeks, until she reached his lips. The two remained that way, holding each other and giving comfort, only once they moved from their spot on the couch to Liz's bedroom but they never let the other go.

_Halliwell Manor_

Earlier that night, after Cole shimmered out to god knows where, probably to his lover, Phoebe couldn't stand to stay in the penthouse any longer. She hurried through packing, only grabbing a few sets of clothes, her laptop, and another pair of shoes and ran out there.

Now she sat in her car staring up at her childhood home and dreaded going inside. How could she tell her sisters that her worrying about Cole's fidelity had been one hundred percent accurate? It was so embarrassing to come crawling back home, admitting to her sisters that once again she failed at life.

Unbeknownst to Phoebe, Prue had spotted her car outside from the living room window. Prue became worried when she didn't come in, so instead she came out to Phoebe.

She startled her little sister when she knocked on the passenger window. Phoebe gave a little squeak but saw Prue and let her in.

"Want to tell me why you're sitting out here instead of coming inside?" Prue gently asked. Something happened; more than likely it'd be what she feared would come to pass.

Phoebe opened and closed her mouth, starting to talk then stopped.

Prue shut her eyes in sympathy. It was what she thought. There'd be no way Phoebe would be here, sitting in her car if she and Cole hadn't broken up. If it had been an argument Phoebe would come over but she wouldn't stay in the car dreading coming inside, she'd be charging in fuming at what they fought over.

"Come here sweetie." Prue gathered Phoebe into her embrace as best she could.

As soon as her older sister's arms came around her, protecting her from the heartache, Phoebe broke down. "How could this happen? I thought we were ok." She cried. "Not perfect but ok."

"What happened tonight?" Prue prodded.

"I came home and Cole was sitting in the dark. He wanted to talk." She sniffled and the whole story poured out. Every excruciating detail was laid out in the front seat of her Mini Cooper. "He really is seeing someone else and he loves her."

"I'm sorry Pheebs." Prue held onto her tightly. "I wish I could make this better for you. Make it so you don't have to feel this pain." She kissed her temple. "I can vanquish him for you. He's Belthazor now it won't be too hard."

Phoebe laughed sadly. "I might take you up on that." She wiped her nose with a tissue. "My heart hurts Prue." She sobbed.

"I know. We'll help you get through this. When you're ready you'll meet guys ten times hotter than Cole could ever be and in a few months you'll be saying 'Cole who?' I promise." Prue stroked Phoebe's hair.

"In a few months Cole will be balding with a beer belly and look like a haggard eighty year old man vying for his youth." Phoebe predicted.

"Absolutely. And while he's going through that rabid transformation you'll still be as beautiful as you are now. If it's possible you'll be even prettier." Prue confirmed.

Phoebe, who was enjoying their game continued with, "While I'm becoming prettier and Cole uglier he's going to see that he made a mistake in leaving me and he'll come begging to have me back. He'll be lucky if I tell him to get in line behind the other thousands of candidates vying for my attention."

The two sat in Phoebe's car for a few minutes more, making predictions on her and Cole's future each more outlandish than the last. "Are you ready to come inside?" Prue asked after a few silent moments.

Phoebe sighed, "I guess."

"Come on." Prue gently tugged at Phoebe's shirt and got out of the car. Phoebe followed suit, grabbing her purse. Prue reached into the back and pulled the light blue duffle bag from the floor, she waited for Pheebs to join her on the sidewalk and the two went inside the Halliwell Manor together.

TBC


	9. Chapter 8

Note: Sorry for the long delay, no excuse except real life got in the way, for more info head to my profile, there's a longer explanation. But finally here's the next chapter. Hope you enjoy.

**Chapter 8**

_Next day; Underworld_

"Well?" Tally glared from her alter.

"They weren't in the office today." Mark reported back. "Cole called in sick. And Miss Parker had some appointments."

His demon master growled low in her throat. "I don't suppose you staked out the secretary's home? Please tell me you were smart enough to do that?"

Mark took a desperate step forward. "I did go there." She needed to know he could do what he had been tasked to do. Anything to keep her from abusing him more often than she already did. The pain and degradation he had to go through normally was nothing compared to what she inflicted on him when he messed up.

Tally finally took her gaze off her alter; a wicked gleam touched her black eyes. "And?"

Mark handed her the recorder. "Neither were sick." He pressed play. Immediately sounds of sex came through the small speakers. At first it could have been anyone losing themselves to pleasure but then distinct voices and phrases were heard. The secretary shouted 'Cole, please!' and 'how she'd vanquish him if he didn't stop teasing her', while Belthazor's human half chuckled sinisterly and told his "little witch" to be patient and when he finally allowed her release, along with his own, he growled out 'I love you Liz'.

Smiling happily Tally nearly kissed her slave. "One more brick to add to the pile." She was one step closer to paying back Belthazor for his treachery. No one made a fool out of Talinia and lived…well, lived pain free anyway.

Belthazor had been a sought after ally for many factions. She was leader of one such faction. Although half human he was vicious and took joy in the human and supernatural kills he made. He would have been a wonderful General and second in command for her army.

Tossing away the painful memories of the past before they overtook her Tally waved Mark away. "Put that recording into the Phoebe Halliwell file." She ordered.

"Yes mistress." Mark rushed to do what she asked.

As her slave left Talinia exhaled. Although she wanted to send that file off to the youngest Halliwell that second she couldn't. She had to bide her time. Although she was close to having everything in place she wasn't quite there yet and if she sent off the file too soon it would throw all that she worked so hard to achieve out the window. She could wait, she [i]_would_[/i] wait.

_That night; Liz's Apartment_

"This was a wonderful day." Liz snuggled up against Cole's side, her hand splayed on his bare chest, her tanned leg draped across his thigh, with his large warm hand rubbing her naked back both of them reveling in their closeness.

Cole kissed her forehead. "It was. Did you like playing hooky?" Wanting to enjoy their first day as an official couple, despite not being public yet, Cole called in sick and had his cases moved to later days in the week and into next week. While Liz only had to let him know and since he knew it was an easy call.

"I'll have you know I've played hooky before. I'm more of a rebel than you think." She spoke in a teasingly haughty tone.

Gently he kissed the top of her ear tickling the sensitive flesh. "I know you are. Nobody could do the naughty things you've done with me over these last few months without having some rebel in them." The husky timbre against her ear got her primed for another round with her boyfriend.

Boyfriend. That word seemed odd, almost too tame for what she and Cole were. They were lovers, yes. Cheaters, yes. Mortal enemies, technically. But boyfriend and girlfriend didn't seem quite right.

As she stared up into his wicked eyes she realized that the label of what they were now didn't matter. In the end they were Liz and Cole…or Liz and Belthazor. Lovers and friends and maybe more. That was all that really mattered right then. Everything else they'd figure out later.

_Two Days Later; Halliwell Manor_

"His things were gone?" Piper sat with Phoebe on the couch.

"Yea. I went to the penthouse to pick up some more of my stuff." Phoebe sniffed, wiping her nose with a tissue. "It was all gone, he didn't leave anything of his there."

Piper tucked her hair behind her ear. "I knew I should have gone with you." She mentally kicked herself for letting Phoebe talk her out of it.

Phoebe disagreed. "No, it was important I did that alone. You would have blown Cole up and Prue would have constantly made him airborne, throwing him into walls and anything else breakable."

"It's no less than what he deserves." Piper grumbled. "Did he at least leave a note?"

The youngest Halliwell shrugged her shoulders. "Kind of. He left me the Penthouse, a short note was with it. Cole wrote that the Penthouse is mine despite knowing I don't want to live there anymore. I can keep it, rent it, sell it, anything. Then he wrote that he was sorry for hurting me and he wished me happiness."

"Sorry? He wrote he was sorry? How about not screwing some bimbo with easy spread legs that would have been a better idea." Piper angrily scoffed.

"Whoa, I came in at the wrong time." Liz stood awkwardly at the entryway to the living room and cringed. If…when the sisters found out it was she who was the other woman with the 'easy spread legs' would they still think that unflattering description of her. No, they probably wouldn't, it'd be worse. Then she wouldn't be someone they didn't know, it'd be an added betrayal that they couldn't forgive.

Phoebe twisted her neck around and smiled sadly at their cousin. "Oh, hi sweetie. We're just…" Phoebe hesitated.

Piper sighed and spoke in a quiet and sensitive tone, "Cole and Phoebe broke up a couple days ago. She went back to the penthouse and all his stuff was gone." She explained not realizing that Liz already knew what happened and that she knew more than they did.

Liz glanced down at the floor and shook her head. "I am so sorry Phoebe." It broke her heart to see her cousin so heartbroken but she had no one to blame but herself and Cole. "Is there anything I can do?"

"No. I'll be fine. This is just a bump in the road." She wiped her eyes.

Piper stroked Phoebe's hair and smiled at Liz. "What did you need Liz?"

Seeing Phoebe in the room grieving her ended relationship almost made her chicken out but she didn't want anyone, especially the sisters coming unannounced to her apartment that weekend. Chris was next on her list of people to tell. "Just wanted to let you two know that I'm having company over on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, so please tell Leo no orbing in. My home and cell phone will stay on but any magical visitors coming in a magical way are banned for the weekend."

Phoebe showed the first truly happy smile since her break up. "A visitor?" She quirked an eyebrow. "One that requires privacy…who are you spending this weekend with? A guy? A romantic type guy?" She asked hopefully.

"Why are you so interested?" Liz perched her body on the arm of the chair. "Figured you'd rather keep men out of the conversation for a while." She gently questioned.

"No, not men. Just Cole. And since now I'm single I've got to live vicariously through other people." Phoebe reclined back and put her legs on the arm rest next to Liz's legs. "So who is he?"

Liz hesitated briefly; she realized that not answering would give the impression that she wasn't comfortable telling who she was seeing. She shrugged, "You know I told you about the guy from work?"

"Corset wearing guy?" Piper piped up.

"I hope you mean the guy I wore the corset for and not a guy who wears a corset? I prefer to be the one to wear the corset in the relationship." Liz joked.

Phoebe chuckled. "So it is him?" She deduced. "You've hardly told us anything about him."

Liz shook her head. "I don't think he's necessarily boyfriend material, more like I got an itch he can scratch." Instantly she felt guilty, not only was she lying to her family she also reduced her weekend plans with Cole to a fling when it was anything but.

Phoebe smiled, "There is nothing wrong with that kind of a weekend. Enjoy it. But don't be afraid to open yourself up for a relationship." She delicately advised Liz.

Liz stiffened her back and playfully asked, "That sounds more love columnist than loving cousin. Why?"

"It's been a while since I've seen you have a relationship. While there's nothing wrong with playing the field and getting a taste of the different flavors out there it can be lonely."

"Ok, yes. My last official boyfriend was a while ago. But that doesn't mean I'm not open to being in a relationship. I just haven't met anyone that amazing yet." Yet another lie to her concerned cousin, maybe she should make a spread sheet so she could keep it all straight. It couldn't hurt.

Piper got a questioning look on her face. "I've never seen you had an official boyfriend. Just a lot of dates. Who was an actual boyfriend?"

Clearing her throat Liz stood up and waved her hands in an 'I'm done' manner. "This is a conversation I don't want to be in anymore. I've dated, I've got some itches scratched, and that's how I want it to be for now. If I meet someone that I want to be more than I'll happily open my heart and hope they open theirs too. Until that time, I'm enjoying my life." She announced to the room. "With that being said, I'm going to go tell Chris about my no-orbing in weekend."

"Sweetie you don't have to go. We're just concerned about you." Phoebe leaned forward to take Liz's hand but Liz backed away quickly.

Hurt flashed over Phoebe's face but the last thing Liz wanted was for Phoebe to get a premonition of the upcoming weekend. Or anything else Cole related. Although it was difficult for her youngest cousin to get a premonition when touching members of her family, it wasn't impossible and Liz couldn't take that chance.

"I know you're concerned but you don't have to be." She kissed two of her fingers and waved to them. "See you ladies next week, unless an emergency makes me cut the weekend short." With that she hurried from the family home desperate to get away from her guilt and their worry.

TBC


	10. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

The twenty minute drive from the Halliwell's to Maria's passed quickly. She called to make sure her friend was up and wanted visitors before dropping in, with Maria being a brand new owner of a struggling club, she worked a lot of nights, then with her part time job at a local clothing store, and then doing research for and writing her music column for The Bay Mirror, Maria spent most of her free time sleeping.

With a skip in her step she rang the doorbell to Maria's. Her friend was all smiles when she opened the door. "Hey," She gave Liz a hug and moved aside to let her in. "Welcome to the chaos, girl."

Chaos was right. The living room was covered in so much paper products that Liz wondered how many forests were residing in the home. "You know we have these things called computers now." She teased gently.

"Ha ha. Very funny. Remind me why I thought it was a good idea to try to save a failing club?"

"Because you love music and you had some great ideas to turn the fate of that place around, which are starting to pay off." Liz explained what Maria already knew; she just needed someone else to say it every now and again.

Leaning against the door jam separating the hallway from the living room Maria tossed the dish towel she held over her shoulder and crossed her arms. "Fine, use my own words against me." She grinned, "Last night we nearly broke even."

"That's great." That deserved another hug which Maria happily accepted. "See you can do this. You're kicking ass babe and just you wait, soon you'll be kicking P3's numbers."

"Shouldn't you be upset at that? It's your cousin's club you're hoping I beat." Maria pointed out.

Liz shrugged. "No contest, best friend I've known for over half my life who's been more like a sister, or blood family I only met a few years ago. No brainer."

"Wouldn't advertise that to the sisters." Maria commented.

"Add that to everything else I don't tell them." The two friends walked through the front hall toward the kitchen.

"Cole?" Maria went to the sink and pulled out a soapy pot. Picking up a scrub brush she got back to the dishes.

Liz didn't say anything, just nodded. She grabbed a dry towel and took the pot when Maria was done, rinsing it out and dried it. Bending down she put the pot back where it was supposed to be.

"He broke up with Phoebe." She told her friend who had basically known about her and Cole since the beginning.

"What? That's great." Maria never liked that Cole had been with Liz and continued to pursue Liz while still with Phoebe. "Are you two going to go public?"

"Not right away. He and Phoebe ended things yesterday, I think it'd be tacky to just show up on the sister's doorstep, 'Hey meet my new boyfriend'." She dried a plate and put it in the cabinet.

Maria shut the water off, "I didn't mean something like that but go out to dinner, share an actual outside in the open air date type thing." She didn't expect Liz to go announcing her involvement with her boss in the local paper but at least a little something that wasn't as clandestine as quickies in the office or shadowed touches.

Liz shrugged. "Eventually we'll do that. I'm sure we will…" She trailed off.

"Talk to me." Maria noticed her hesitation.

Liz leaned her hip against the counter, still holding the plate she dried. "What if being public changes everything."

"Wouldn't it have to change?"

"In some ways. Ways I'm looking forward to." She wanted to be able to hold Cole's hand as they walked down the street. Wanted to be able to kiss him when she wanted and not have to wait for a moment where they were out of sight of others. She wanted to go out to dinner with him and be introduced as his girlfriend, not his fiancee's cousin, friend, or secretary. "But what if we're only good together in secret. What if going public kills this relationship?"

Maria put her slightly damp hands on Liz's shoulders. "Then it wasn't meant to be and Cole wouldn't have been the right man for you."

"I want him to be the right one. I love him so much." Liz teared up and instantly was brought into a familiar and welcomed hug.

"Whatever happens, it'll work out the way it's supposed to. Don't dwell on the bad." Maria felt Liz chuckle. "I know, strange advice coming from me considering I thrive on dwelling on the bad but trust me. Take it a day at a time, go out on this path with an open mind, and hopefully you two come out of this together and stronger."

"You're a great friend, you know that?" Liz squeezed her tight. Maria mostly didn't approve of how Cole was in her life. She liked him when they were friends and employer/employee, but once it turned romantic she wasn't a supporter. 'He can go after you all he wants once he's not seeing Phoebe but not before.' Maria was fond of saying to her occasionally.

Despite Maria's dislike of the situation though, she was always there for her. Never once had she turned Liz away when she needed advice or to talk about Cole.

"I know I am." Maria stated.

Smiling and pulling back Liz wiped at her eyes. "So humble too." She teased.

Maria shrugged. "Not in my nature." The two finished the last of the dishes when Liz asked if Chris was around at all.

"No, he got summoned away by Them." Maria rolled her eyes.

"Again. What could they want this time?" Liz scoffed angry on Maria's behalf.

The girls walked out into the living and sat on the couch. "What they want every time they seem to summon him. To tell him to stop seeing me or giving him some bogus assignment that some other Whitelighter could do in their sleep."

Over the last year and a half Chris and Maria had dated, the Elders had tried to put a stop to their relationship. They were constantly watching their Whitelighters and in turn watching whoever they were with a daily basis. If Liz thought the stories she heard from Piper and Leo were bad, this was worse. The Elders clearly didn't want Whitelighters dating witches or their charges, however humans…they were even stricter with when it came to those rules. Humans, according to them, had no business knowing anything about the magical world.

It was bad enough when the Elders found out Maria knew about Liz's witch side but then to find out that she was also dating one of their newer Whitelighters, their orbs hit the fan. "This is ridiculous." Liz squeezed the bridge of her nose trying to fight the headache the situation was bound to cause.

"No kidding." Maria grumbled.

"Why is Chris even going along with their games? He's never been a tow the company line kind of guy."

Maria fidgeted uncomfortably, "It's, at least partly, because of me." When Liz gave her a confused cock of the eyebrow she continued. "Ok. If he gets booted from the roster up there he loses all his charges. They will assign different Whitlighters for all those witches. Despite the crap the Elders put him through he loves helping witches and setting them on the right path, showing them how to fight evil and save innocents."

"You don't want him to give up something he clearly loves and the way for Chris to keep his charges is to play along." Liz finished for her.

"Exactly. How would he look at me if I made him give that up? So I keep relatively quiet about it. Chris isn't stupid he knows I hate it every time they call him away but I'm not going to be the reason he gives up something he loves."

Liz held onto Maria's hand, "But, playing devil's advocate here, how much longer will you be able to handle being in relationship where your boyfriend is hardly around?" Maria remained silent and Liz pushed on. "Tell Chris how you feel, maybe come up with a way to please both the Elders and you…as difficult as that'll be. Because if you don't your relationship might last much longer."

Maria glared at her longtime friend, not really angry but annoyed that she might be right. "Tell Phoebe about you and Cole. This secret can only strain and possibly kill your relationship with her and your Warren/Halliwell side of the family." She snapped back.

"Et tu?" Liz half joking and half hurt.

"Don't give me truth, if you don't want it either." Maria smirked, any annoyance or hurt rolled away from them.

"Fair." Liz agreed. "Why couldn't we fall for a nice normal, and in my case, available guys?"

"That'd be too boring for us. We've dated aliens for heaven's sake, we require a lot of craziness to not be bored to tears." Maria laughed.

"Can't argue with that. Speaking of craziness, can you tell Chris to not orb into my place during the weekend? Cole and I are spending it in."

"Sure. And you don't want any more surprise orbing. Gotcha." Maria knew Liz and Cole had a couple of close calls with Chris orbing in and almost catching Cole there in Liz's bed or in her kitchen late at night when he should have been with Phoebe. Thankfully Cole was awake at the time and saw some blue and white orbs coming from the ceiling, shimmering out before Chris was fully formed. "I'll let him know."

Kissing Maria on the cheek Liz hopped up from the couch. "Thank you. Now I need to go shopping. Cole's seen all my lingerie, need some new outfits. Want to come?"

"Yea, I got a few hours before I need to head to bed. Give me a couple minutes to change." Twenty minutes later with Maria changed, she and Liz headed out for an afternoon of shopping.

TBC


	11. Chapter 10

Note: This chapter is a little shorter than I planned but I moved an Underworld section that was at the end of the chapter and I'm putting it either later in chapter 11 or in the beginning of chapter 12, because it'll fit better there.

/Texting/

**Chapter 10**

"This top is cute." Maria held up a red top with sparkly beading on it.

"Mm, it is. Try it on."

"But it's seventy dollars. Can I justify spending that much on a shirt?" Maria held it away from her, looked at it, then turned it back toward Liz. "Is it really seventy bucks cute?"

"Try it on." She repeated, smirking. "If you hate how it looks on you problem solved. If you love it than we'll continue with 'is it worth it'."

Maria shrugged but kept it on her hand while searching through the clearance items. Fifteen minutes later the two bought a couple shirts, Maria didn't buy the red top, and a few skirts. With their purchases in hand they walked a few shops down to Victoria's Secret.

Liz picked out some outfits to try on and made her way to the dressing room. Slipping into a relatively simple but sexy nightie she dug her phone out from her pants. She snapped a picture and sent it to Cole with the question. /Do you like?/

_Cole's Office _

"My client accidentally hit the victim. He is remorseful and horrified that he hurt that man but you're pushing for assault, armed robbery, and attempted murder, which is a bit extreme counselor." Defense attorney, Ford Deacon, stated strongly.

"The tire iron just magically flew out of his hand, is that it?" Cole leaned forward on his desk and chuckled in disbelief. The man was not magical or demonic, he was a normal, albeit evil, human. "Your client Mr. Deacon, admitted to police that he hit Mr. Randal over the head with a tire iron. A witness saw him standing over the victim going through his wallet. That doesn't sound very remorseful." He shot back to the defendant's lawyer.

Granted the attempted murder charge was unlikely to fly, despite the severe head injury Mr. Randal received. The victim required eighteen stitches on the side of his skull, he still, two months later, has difficulty walking without getting dizzy and light headed. Not to mention the array of bruises and cuts he got when he fell to the ground as a result of the tire iron to the head. Add to that how the defendant left the victim bleeding out on the street, he had at least a decent case for attempted murder. However, armed robbery and assault were slam dunks.

This meeting had not been on his books today. All he had planned for the afternoon was getting his ducks in a row for the trial next week against Mr. Webster, however Webster's lawyer called him to set up a meeting. They wanted to discuss a deal. Cole had been interested in hearing what the two had to say, maybe getting the case off his docket. But seeing how little guilt the accused felt, he was no longer entertaining a deal.

Mr. Deacon's client smirked at him. Arrogant little shit was confident in his lawyer's ability to get him off, despite his foul up in speaking with the detectives and telling them he hit the man. Cole itched to throw an energy ball at him. His smugness grated on his nerves.

"Mr. Webster felt pressured to confess to something. The police were throwing baseless accusations at him and an eye witness to boot. When the woman, who falsely id'd my client, even admitted that the other man had much longer hair than my client did at the time of the lineup."

Cole stared blankly at the two bottom feeders across from him. "So he got a haircut. Everything else our eye witness described matched your client to a 'T'. Right down to the tattoo on his left shoulder and the jagged scar on his neck. You're grasping at straws here Ford." On his desk his cell phone vibrated. Still glaring at them he swiped open his phone.

A message from Liz. He tapped the screen and opened the message. There, wearing a light teal nightie, was his gorgeous girlfriend, Liz. Lace cupped her breasts, giving him only a hint of the dark pink areola underneath. The bottom of the nightie was decorated with that same lace and the satin smooth fabric brought out Liz's soft curves. Suddenly he didn't care all that much about the case in front of him.

Tearing his gaze away from the beautiful photo now gracing his phone he saw the text underneath asking. /Do you like?/

Quickly Cole set his phone face down, he pushed away from the desk and stood up. "Well, it appears there won't be a deal made. Your client has shown no remorse or admitted guilt and tried to make amends. Thank you for your time gentlemen but it appears we have a trial to prepare for."

Mr. Deacon pointed to his cell phone. "What was that about Mr. Turner?"

"Nothing to do with this case. Please see yourselves out." He abruptly ended the meeting. No point in wasting any more time.

While not quite believing him, Mr. Deacon let it go and he and his client left the ADA's office. Leaving the side of his desk, where he watched the two leave, Cole returned to his chair and sent back a text. /Very much so. Buy that one./

He waited for a few moments for Liz to respond, when she did, he wasn't disappointed. /Well, what about this one?/

Cole scrolled down, the picture showed Liz wearing a black lace corset top, no breast cups, and sexy tantalizing garters and fishnet thigh high stockings. His lover had carefully placed her arm over her breasts so he couldn't see the full effect.

/Tease./ He texted back. Followed quickly by. /Love that too./

/Hehe./

Leaning forward Cole checked his appointment book for today. A couple more meetings awaited him but not for another hour. He'd teach his little witch that it's dangerous to tease him. On his office door Jimmy knocked. Before the mail guy entered the room Cole shimmered out, only hearing the first four words of his sentence.

"Mr. Turner, sorry to—"

Cole shimmered into the dressing room hall. No one was there. Looking up at the domed video camera he waved his hand, making the camera go on the fritz. In the dressing room closest to him he could hear Liz moving around, lingerie rustling softly.

Quickly he glanced around then, making sure no dressing room attendant was around; quietly he knocked on the dressing room door. The rustling stopped, he could hear Liz put down, what he assumed, was her phone to open the dressing room door a crack. "Hey." She whispered happily, her smile widening at his arrival.

"You should know better than to tease me." Cole seductively threatened.

"I like teasing you." She was about to say something else but the footsteps of the attendant could clearly be heard and she didn't dare speak right then.

Thinking fast Cole shimmered in behind Liz, took her around the waist, kissed her exposed shoulder, and closed the door. Keeping the worker from knowing anything naughty was happening mere feet from her.

Liz quashed the giggle bubbling up in her throat, even as her lover turned her around to face him, and put a hand gently over her mouth. "Shh." He murmured low.

Feeling playful she nipped at his palm. Sinister eyes narrowed on her, he lifted her up. Liz softly licked at the patch of skin she bit.

Cole removed his hand, only to replace it with his lips. Liz loved kissing him. She could kiss him for hours and still want to get lost in him for a few hours more. "Looks like this outfit is a keeper."

"It's the woman in the outfit." He rumbled against her neck.

"Good answer." She whispered.

"Oh my God! Liz, get out here quick!"

Hearing Maria scream, Liz jumped out of Cole's embrace. Thinking quickly she grabbed her jacket and flung it over the top of the lingerie before rushing outside toward her friend, with Cole hot on her heels.

Skidding to a halt Liz searched the store, ready to fight a demon that had to be attacking Maria from how she shouted. Instead she saw Maria hugging a tall, lanky man. Laughing and saying how she missed him.

Stepping forward and smiling Liz laughed too. "Alex?"

TBC


End file.
